A peace seminar attended by more than 50 Jewish and Arab women ended here last weekend with pledges to meet again and work together for an end to the Arab-Israeli conflict.
But the participants were unable to agree on a joint political statement.
The event, organized by the Secular Jewish Community Center, headed by David and Simone Susskind, was attended mainly by Israeli women and Palestinian women from the West Bank and Gaza Strip.
They were joined by Jewish women from the United States, Britain, France and Belgium.
The Israelis included two members of parliament, Nava Arad of the Labor Party and Shulamit Aloni of the Citizens Rights Movement.
The seminar was held at European Community headquarters, with the PLO representatives from Brussels and The Hague attending as observers.
According to Simone Susskind, such gatherings must continue “in order to break the psychological barriers between Israelis and Palestinians.”
But the barriers persisted when it came to the Seven-point political statement for which unanimous endorsement was sought.
Arad, the Labor Knesset member, refused to approve the document because it didn’t agree with her party’s platform.
Aloni, whose small faction sits in the opposition, insisted there was “only minor disagreement about the wording of the text.”
Another participant stressed that although “specific points” created problems, everyone “agreed on the principles.”
CONFLICT OVER PLO
The conflicting points reportedly concerned The issue of PLO representation among Palestinians and the call for an independent Palestinian entity.
The statement called for Israeli-Palestinian territorial separation in compliance with U.N. Security Council Resolutions 181, 242 and 338, and an end to Israel’s occupation of the West Bank and Gaza Strip.
Resolution 181 is the original resolution partitioning Palestine into Jewish and Arab states, which the U.N General Assembly adopted on Nov. 29, 1947.
The statement also spoke of self-determination and sovereignty for the Palestinian nation.
Several Palestinians expressed disappointment that unanimity eluded the gathering. But they stressed that the meeting was “just a start.”
Hanan Ashrawi, an art professor at Bir Zeit University in the West Bank, said the participants had shown a “great sense of responsibility, seriousness and maturity.”
The peace initiative being pressed by Israeli prime Minister Yitzhak Shamir, which calls for Palestinian elections to choose representatives to negotiate with Israel, was not discussed during the two-day seminar.
Yael Dayan, an Israeli author close to the Labor Party and the daughter of the late Moshe Dayan, observed it was the only plan around and since there were no options, “we should use the Likud’s moderation as long as it exists.”
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